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Funny, he actually got back to me from my asking permission here. I let him know I already got permission from him though facebook and he said he was far behind at getting his requests out because it's baseball season for his kids. Busy man, and I can fully understand that.

Someone using the built in scrambler in some inexpensive radios will sound like they’re on the wrong sideband. It’s really just inverted frequencies.

That sounds exactly like someone in my area. He started getting upset because people were actually using it! I somewhat understand why some repeater owners are like that, but no one owns those frequencies I operate a repeater in my area and wish more people would use it. I have had well over 100 requests and if there are a handful of regular users, I'd be exaggerating. I certainly don't have one of those elaborate systems where I'm paying tower rental, but do have some expenses. Between my 50' tower, hardline, good N connectors, repeater(s), duplexer and antenna, I have well over $1,000 into it, but I actually want people to use it

When I first got the Midland LXT600 FRS/GMRS HT's for use up at the lake where there's zero cell service, My wife seemed to think she HAD to push the Call button before she could talk to me out on the boat from the cabin. I quickly explained to her she could just push the PTT and start talking... I imagine it might be useful in very high noise environments where you may not hear people calling you, and the piercing tone would alert you? Mostly when scanning the channels, if I hear these, it's kids playing radio. "It is about as useful as the 'Alarm' button on many radios." Or a Roger Beep! Sorry, couldn't resist!

Fantastic. I wouldn't doubt it I searched through my junk piles I could find the CB unit. But no antennas I bet.

I’m kinda confused…. all of this seems like an answer to questions no one here asked. ???

I did put one or two clamp of ferrite beads on all of my antennas (right at the base) to help with RFI. But I am running a CA-712EFC for GMRS, a Comet GP9 dual band and three different types of HF antennas. The antennas are between 25 and 50 foot apart. Now if the CA-712EFC is your only antenna then I would not worry about any type of choke since they are tuned and you are using good coax. The loop showing the instructions is more for ease of maintenance and also a little stress relief on the antenna coax connector. The loop allows you to pull the antenna out of its mounting pipe if you ever need to remove the coax for any reason without having to cut any cable ties along the mast/tower. I generally put one loop at the bottom of each antenna for this reason. Now I do have several wraps of coax along with clamp on ferrite beads on my HF antennas to help keep RF out of the shack or from interfering with my VHF/UHF/GMRS antenna coax cables since they are very close to each other where they enter my house.

I had some old 2001 FRS Motorola radios where, all devices configured with the same call tone could be made to vibrate when the call tone came through (even with volume off). Those were the only radios where the button potentially served a purpose other than to amuse seven year olds.

As per the User-Manual in pretty much 100% of radios that have a Call button, the Call button is to send an annoying noise out to all other radios configured in the same 'call-group', so they know you're about to start talking to them.. Think of those old Nextel radio-phones. It is about as useful as the 'Alarm' button on many radios.

I must say, there is a learning curve here; but it's good one. Every couple days I learn something new; either from mistakes or the expert replies I am getting from all of you! Thanks!

During a huge enduro motorcycle race in town, heard some gal on the CH 6 get on the radio to tell her lover her husband passed out and she was sneaking over to his camp....

Happy Father’s Day to you as well. First, are you on a repeater channel? You didn’t say what channel you’re on. On all GMRS radios there are the simplex channels 15 - 22 and there are the repeater channels which are numbered 23 - 30 or something like RP15 - RP22. The repeater channels and the simplex channels receive on the same frequencies, which is in the 462 MHz range. So, channel 15 receives on exactly the same frequency as 23 (or RP15), 16 receives on the same frequency as 24 (RP16), etc. The difference is that the repeater channels transmit at a frequency that is usually 5.000 MHz higher than the simplex channel. So channel 15 receives and transmits on 462.550 MHz, channel 23 (RP15) transmits on 467.550 MHz. Because you mentioned that you’re able to receive just fine, it could be that you’re transmitting on the simplex channel, which would never wake up the receiver.

Yes, but their technology is far better than most of the rest of us have to track signals.

I usually do both. I will ask on a forum but also research online. I like asking because at times people will elaborate what usually works for them and what to stay away from. Along with that, friendships are often made when asking through a forum. A tad more human interaction in forums; something that is lost searching videos over the internet. I hope I did not cause you any distress by asking.

I think this is more of a "what gives them the right?" sovereign citizen take. I'm pretty sure that the writers of the Constitution never quite envisioned the possibility of a wireless communication system back in 1789. At best, they left it up to the People and the individual States with the 9th and 10th amendments. Pretty sure nobody pays much of any attention to the 9th and 10th since the Wickard v. Filburn decision. Feel free to fight the battle. I doubt I'll invest in your fight, but I'd be thrilled to read the legal arguments once you make it to the Supreme Court. I do recall a company called TeraWave who was going to be using Infrared light as an unlicensed high bandwidth beam between buildings. They did some amazing things in the Lab, but once they got out in the real world & put up some systems on rooftops, they discovered that there are some real world problems like fog and rain that played havoc on their systems. Not sure if the FCC got involved in that one, I think all it took was economic reality. Giving up a few hundred MB of bandwidth in exchange for a licensed microwave system with Six Sigma reliability was the winner.

I think the best use for the long whip antennas is for fringe areas of receptions not as your every day carry antenna. Keep one in the car or backpack when out and about and put it on when needed. It does get tiring having it in the way all the time otherwise. You can also keep a mag mount antenna in the car as a back up for even better range if needed and while driving.